On the evening of the 12th Rochambeau dined with
General Heath, a grand illumination of the town taking place afterward,
and each day saw some new festivity to welcome the guests who had made
the American cause their own. The army had been stationed across the
island guarding the town, the right toward the ships and the left upon
the sea, Rochambeau thus carefully covering the position of his vessels
by the batteries. Everything was _en fete_. The people were delighted
with the manners and courtly polish of the French. Robin says of the
discipline insisted on at Newport, "The officers employed politeness
and amenity, the common soldiers became mild, circumspect and
moderate." The French at Newport were no longer the frivolous race,
presumptuous, noisy, full of fatuity, they were reputed to be. They
lived quietly and retired, limiting their society to their hosts, to
whom every day they became dearer. These young nobles of birth and
fortune, to whom a sojourn at court must have given a taste for
dissipation and luxury, were the first to set an example of frugality
and simplicity of life. They showed themselves affable, popular, as if
they had never lived but with men who were on an equality.
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